Van Gogh Oil Pastel Sets

These oil pastels are perfect for older or more advanced students. They are intense in color and particularly soft and pleasant to use, not just on paper and board but also on wood or earthenware.

Talens includes many of the same single pigment colors found in professional brands, but at a more economcial price. Individual pastels are round with paper sleeves and measure 2-3/4" × 7/16" (70 mm × 11 mm).

Van Gogh Oil Pastels are available in open stock. Replace individual colors as they are used up, and keep your sets complete.

Set of 24 w/ FREE Mi-Teintes Grey Tones pad — Perfect for older or more advanced students, Van Gogh Oil Pastels are intense in color and particularly soft and pleasant to use, not just on paper and board but also on wood or earthenware. Purchase a set of 24 and receive a FREE9" × 12"Mi-Teintes Gray Tone pad!

These blend perfectly with sennelier oil pastels and I use them for base layers to save on costs as they are cheaper than the sennelier, harder and tend to last a bit longer. I don't use them alone only for base layers or blending.

I bought a set of these, plus a few extra sticks, and at the same time bought a few sticks of Sennelier oil pastels for comparison. Based on the comments I had read about Sennelier, I fully expected to fall in love with those and relegate the Van Gogh to studies and learning. Not so! The Sennelier is, without a doubt, exceedingly smooth and buttery. Those who say it spreads like lipstick are right. But, for my purposes, I found that the VG oil pastels were better. Why? Being a little stiffer (just a bit), they make lines and details so much better. They are softer than inexpensive brands such as those you find at you local hobby store. They have deep, intense pigments. They blend very well -- I use torchons, a rubber stick blender, even my fingers. The VG oil pastels are a great deal too. I haven't tried every other brand out there but have tried several, and, for me, these fit my needs perfectly. I wish they had even more colors available! Those who say that VG products are a "high end" student grade are probably right. About me: I'm an amateur artist and don't sell my work, I draw and paint purely for pleasure.

Honestly, I'm surprised how many brick and mortar art stores carry open stock only of Van Gogh OPs (and sometimes Sennelier for the "high end"). These just do not seem that soft or blendable to me, and I'd think people trying OPs for the first time could be discouraged. I'd highly recommend looking into the Cra Pas Expressionist line over these. Their colors have individual lightfast ratings given online and are a real bargain. The even softer, (and lightfast) Gallery Artist line of Soft OPs is also a much better buy.

These pastels are wonderful! They are very blendable, smooth and are friendly to accompanying pastels (I use several brands in one piece). Best of all they are almost more-pigment saturated than the most expensive OPs. The colors are punchy, bright and subtle all at the same time. I read somewhere that, though they are lightfast, these are considered "student grade"...no way. I consider myself to be somewhat of an OP snob and am on a constant hunt for great, reasonably priced ones and these more than live up to my high standards for both! DIve in!

PROS: excellent range of colors, labels are easy to read, moderate price, available in open stock, most colors look as good on paper as the more expensive brands, not much crumbling, the white is very opaque and shows up well on medium to dark backgrounds

CONS: some variation among colors in terms of permanence, texture and opacity compared to other brands. In fact, Van Gogh is the most inconsistent of any student or artist level oil pastel I have tried. This isn't necessarily bad, just something to be aware of.

Individual colors may be quite smooth and spreadable,almost like Neopastel. Others may be dry and scratchy, and are more difficult to blend. Opacity can vary quite a bit as well, with some colors giving complete coverage on the first layer, and others giving a thinner coating of pigment. If you are aware of this, it's easy to work around the differences but it does make this brand a bit different. If permanence is a concern, you can check the pigment information provided by Blick and order from open stock to avoid the weaker colors. (Just look up the colors in open stock, and click on the icon to the left to get a lot of very valuable information. Thanks, Blick)!

BOTTOM LINE: The manufacturer rates these as advanced student level pastels, and I think that is fair. To me these are closest to Sakura Expressionist. Would recommend for students, or for advanced artists who can work around the variability in permanence and texture. There are a lot of beautiful colors in the Van Gogh palette, and the price of the larger sets is a real bargain.

this set of pastels offered a wide variety of color- 48- for a very good price. I have two other brands of oil pastels that have their ''pros and cons'', so now have choices depending on the style of work I want to do. glad that I can buy replacement individual colors.

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